Amazon to buy Palm?

Online retailer turned tablet contender, Amazon could be sniffing around the unwanted bits of Palm that are currently lying about unloved on the floors of HP offices.

Venturebeat cites a "well-placed source" who has spilled some beans on the matter and, according to this deep-throated individual, Amazon is the lead contender in the half-hearted scrap for Palm, which HP snapped up for a mere $1.2 billion only to discard as CEO replaced CEO.

Amazon, Venturebeat points out, has form with Palm. Indeed former Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein, has a job in HP’s Personal Services Group as well as a seat on Amazon’s board. He recently said Amazon "would certainly make a great partner" in any bid to expand the webOS ecosystem.

And with the book shop now capitalising on the success of its Kindle Reader with a pocket-priced tablet of its own, its not impossible that webOS could find a home in future Amazon products, or at least give the outfit's patent lawyers some clout as the Android licensing spats mount.

Amazon is bound to be fairly OS agnostic since its main aim is to turn its Kindle Fire into a point of sale device for its own wares, and to worm it into every home.

While neither Amazon nor HP is commenting on the deal, this one has legs in our view.